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Thank you so much for your love and support, in all the ways, of the Mint Julep Jazz Band’s new album endeavor, Battle Axe! We’ll be heading into the studio in April to record the album and in the interim I’ll be getting information from you in the coming weeks and connecting some of you with contributor vendors so that we can fulfill your rewards, which are so deservedly earned for your faith and pledges in our album project. I’ll also be posting our list of Kickstarter backers and contributors on the website for a more proper thank you. Stay tuned!

As we head into our last few days of Kickstarting our second album, Battle Axe, we are so fortunate to be funded at our $12,000 goal and are working toward our stretch goal of vinyl copies of the album if we reach $16,000! If you haven’t pre-ordered the album yet or if you want a tee shirt or any of the other goodies that are only available through Kickstarter, you have until March 11 to become a backer. :)

My next traveling adventure will be roadtripping with my band, the Mint Julep Jazz Band, to Orlando, Florida for ORLX – the Orlando Lindy Exchange! We’ll be performing at the main dances on March 6 and 7, two nights of live music for your Lindy Hopping feet. Looking forward to warmer climates and we hear Orlando has some great venues. Maybe some pool time? Whatever happens, it’s going to be awesome. :)

It’s back to back weekends singing with Michael Gamble and his Rhythm Serenaders, this time I’ll be heading south to warmer climates for Swing Into Spring, a weekend of swing dance workshops in Columbia, South Carolina. We’ll be performing at the Saturday night main dance on February 14, 2015 from 8:00 p.m. to midnight. Come spend Valentines Day with us! ;) For more information on the weekend, visit the Swing Into Spring website.

This weekend I will be flying to Rochester, New York for the very first time to sing with Michael Gamble’s Rhythm Serenaders at the Slow Dance Soiree, a swing dance event hosted by Groove Juice Swing that will focus on slow dancing for Lindy Hoppers. I am looking forward to performing again with the Rhythm Serenaders and visiting a new city, but I must admit that I am not sure what to do with these extremely cold temperatures! Wish me luck in staying warm!

I decided to put together a playlist of all the tunes I sang with the Jonathan Stout Orchestra (aka Jonathan Stout and the Lindy Focus All Star Orchestra) that have been published on the Lindy Focus YouTube channel for my personal reference, then decided it might be good to share it with followers of this website. Here they are, videos available (there were many more performed than recorded, but we are grateful that so many were recorded) from each night of Lindy Focus XIII – I’ve made a YouTube playlist or you can watch them individually below:

COUNT BASIE NIGHT, December 27, 2014 (which was really Billie Holiday night for me, since there were no available old testament Basie female vocal charts):

ARTIE SHAW NIGHT, December 28, 2014 (no videos were filmed of my songs from this night)

DUKE ELLINGTON NIGHT, December 29, 2014

BENNY GOODMAN NIGHT, December 30, 2014

NEW YEAR’S EVE, December 31, 2014 (unofficial known as Kitchen Sink night)

The Mint Julep Jazz Band will be performing at Austin, Texas’ unique and awesome event, Hot Rhythm Holiday, a weekend of dances, workshops, and live music focusing on the dances Balboa and Collegiate Shag. This is the band’s first fly-out gig and we’re excited, but hope everything goes well at the airport. Cross your fingers for no delays! Once we get there on January 17, we hope we’ll have the afternoon to explore a Austin a bit before we perform at The Fed that night. We’ll be sharing the stage with Austin’s own Thrift Set Orchestra for four sets of live music at the Saturday night dance!

The Mint Julep Jazz Band has been working diligently to get everything in place to launch a Kickstarter for our second album on January 11, 2015 – we’ll be having our Kickstarter launch party at Common 414 in Raleigh, with the full 8 piece band playing from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. Come join us to celebrate!

The title of the album, “Battle Axe,” is taken from a great Jimmie Lunceford tune in our book, and we anticipate that this will be a really fun album to put together, based on that title. Alexandrea Thomsen of Dtownperspective is putting together an awesome Kickstarter video for us and we have lots of new and interesting rewards in the works, as well as bringing back some old favorites (cupcakes, anyone?). Looking forward to January 11!

It’s not every day that you get to sing with a big band, much less FIVE NIGHTS of big band music! This year I return to Lindy Focus to lend my vocals to the Jonathan Stout Orchestra, which will be featuring the music of a different bandleader each night of the event – Count Basie, Artie Shaw, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and New Year’s Eve will feature all the other great tunes in Jonathan’s big band book. The lineup of musicians has been referred to as a “murderer’s row” of jazz/swing musicians and I’m delighted to be among their ranks – to have the opportunity to work with all of them and perform for so many wonderful dancers is such a joy! I’ll also be lending my DJ skills to the late night Balboa room – see you soon!

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Vintage dancer, DJ, songbird, blogger

Laura Windley is the songstress and proprietress of the North Carolina-based Mint Julep Jazz Band, a little big band specializing in the hot jazz and swing of the 1920's, 1930's, and early 1940's. She is involved in the swing dance community in Raleigh and Durham, NC as an event organizer and DJ, as well as serving as the main contributor for Lindy Shopper, a blog about swing dance clothing, shoes, and other things dancers may find useful.